Painting depicting French soldiers charging into deadly German rifle fire, August 1914. Today 109 years ago, on August 7, 1914, the Battle of the Frontiers began, one of the earliest yet bloodiest campaigns of the Western Front. Following the German declaration of war on France on August 3, both nations prepared to go on the offensive, with the French deploying their Plan XVII and the Germans their Schlieffen Plan. On August 7, 1914, the French invaded Alsace and Lorraine, the regions they had lost in 1871. The French achieved early success and advanced, but suffered thousands of casualties, and a German push on August 20 at Sarrebourg set them back to their starting points. On August 21, the French attacked again further north in the Battles of the Ardennes, Charleroi and on August 22 at Rossignol. The French suffered extreme casualties due to advancing en masse across open terrain in broad daylight with minimal artillery support, wearing extremely visible dark blue and red uniforms...